Baby Sitting
by Merdina
Summary: Reuben discovers himself becoming attatched to Jumba's kids. Oneshot continuation of Jeeba Bessotria.


Baby Sitting

Dr Jumba Jookiba had been through a lot in his lifetime. He had been imprisoned over fifty times, sentenced to death twice and tortured five times for many different "misunderstandings". He had stood up to his punishments, had always managed to get out in the nick of time, and prided himself in the fact that he could handle any form of torture. Except for the one that he had been subjected to for the past two and a half years.

He was sitting on the couch with his daughter Ruby bouncing up and down on one of his legs, giggling inanely. He tried to stand up, but she clung to his arm, squealing.

"Daddy!!! You have to play with me!!! I want to be Princess Ruby!"

"Now, Ruby, Daddy is thinking… would like to have lunch and be getting back to work now. You can go play with Mummy, no?"

"I WANNA PLAY!!!"

"But we have played princesses five times today already. Are you not getting tired?"

"No. I like being a princess. I wanna be a princess when I grow up."

Jumba groaned, and placed her on a chair. Ruby loved this game. In her head she was wearing a long flowing dress and a golden crown on her head. Jumba bowed, cleared his throat and began.

"All hail Princess Ruby, prettiest girl on the planet of Earth and…"

"DAD! Dad, guess what? I found a worm in the garden! Can we cut it up? Oh please, please, please?" Keltzam, his son had run in, holding a worm proudly above his head. Keltzam didn't want to be a prince when he grew up. He wanted to be a scientist like his dad.

"Keltzam, Daddy is playing Princess Game with Ruby. Can you be waiting until later?"

"No! Worm!"

"JEEBA! Please be getting in here now!" Jumba had lost it. Jeeba came running in and grabbed up Ruby.

"There. Ruby, you can come shopping with Mummy. I'll buy you some sweets if you're good. Keltzam, get that worm out of the house and you can come too. Jumba… go get some lunch, honey."

Jeeba had always been better at getting the kids to behave, but soon they became too much even for her. Nani came round one day to find the kids running round the house wildly. Keltzam was scribbling on the walls and Ruby was creating havoc with Jeeba's makeup. Jeeba simply sat watching them, looking tired and depressed.

"My god, Jeeba, you really need a day off. I'd baby sit, but I've got to get to work in 10 minutes. Hey, I know! What about Reuben?"

"Reuben?" Jeeba looked up sleepily.

"Yeah, he's their godfather. He hasn't got anything else to do; he'd be perfect for the job. Besides, you know how much Ruby likes him."

"You know what, Nani? I think you're right."

And so Reuben was called over, and he trudged up the path feeling slightly apprehensive of what was to come. Jeeba sounded as though she was at the end of her rope, and he could hear the sound of smashing china even as she was on the phone to him. He knocked on the door, and Jeeba opened it slowly. Her hair was tousled, there was a handprint on her skirt that looked like blue paint and there was jam on her blouse. Her eyes were half closed, and she moved as though she were in a dream.

"Hey Jeeba. Whoa… You need some coffee or something." She grinned weakly and invited him in. The kids were nowhere to be seen. Apparently Jeeba had sent them off to play in the garden so she could try and tidy up. As Jeeba went into the kitchen, Jumba walked, zombie-like, into the room and sat on the sofa. Reuben wasn't even sure if he had seen him, so he decided to chat.

"Hi. So, erm… how's being a dad going for ya?"

"I haven't slept in two and a half years. If I had realised that to make ultimate evil all I had to do was to be having kids, I would be supreme ruler of universe by now…"

"Aw, c'mon! They can't be… _that_ bad, can they?"

"Have you lived with them recently? Is hell, Reuben, is absolute hell."

Reuben looked at him, and realised that he was probably telling the truth. One of his eyes twitched nervously when he spoke, and the pupils of three of them were tiny, whilst the pupil of one was huge. He trembled as though he had drunk fifty cups of coffee one after the other, and by the amount of empty jars of it in the trash, it looked as though he had.

"Why do you put up with it, then?"

"Am getting good feeling from being father. Is like creating experiment, on larger scale."

Reuben considered this curiously.

Jeeba hurried in, grabbing Jumba's arm. She called in the children.

"Now then, darlings. You've got to be good, because your Uncle Reuben is going to be looking after you, ok?" Ruby's face lit up.

"Yay! Uncle Reuben!" She turned around to him, a smile on her pudgy cheeks. "Can we have special sandwiches and go to the beach and play in the spaceship and see Lilo and Stitch and Uncle Pleakley and Uncle Matrid?"

However, Keltzam didn't seem as thrilled. He scowled.

"Uncle Reuben's a jerk."

"Keltzam!" Jeeba snapped, "Say sorry to Uncle Reuben."

"But Daddy said that Uncle Reuben's a jerk and that he tried to steal you and hurt Daddy but Daddy stopped him. But how could he steal you? You can't steal people, can you?"

Reuben laughed and Jumba shuffled uncomfortably on the spot. Jeeba turned around, aghast.

"You told your son that his godfather tried to steal me? What were you thinking?"

Jumba was about to answer, but Reuben cut in.

"Hey, it's OK. No harm done." Jumba and Jeeba left for the hotel to get some rest.

Keltzam continued moodily to Reuben.

"How did you steal Mummy? And how did you hurt my Daddy? Nothing can hurt my Daddy, so how'd you do it?"

Reuben grinned.

"You just tell your Daddy to watch out for any more flying trees."

As the hours passed, Reuben realised why Jumba and Jeeba had such a hard time controlling the kids. Ruby did whatever she was told, but whilst you were asking her to do something, Keltzam would disappear off and wreak havoc. He had taken them off to the ship to see Gantu.

Gantu had missed a lot since he was sent to prison, and was finding it hard to adjust to the fact that not only had both Reuben and Jumba proposed to Jeeba, but she had married one of them and had two kids as well. Still, the kids were nice enough, and he was laughing as he watched Keltzam playing up for Reuben. At lunchtime he had refused five different sandwiches, and when he finally chose one, he ate half of it and then threw it across the room. He had continued his scribbling from earlier on the walls in Reuben's room, and finished it off by lifting Reuben off the floor and throwing him down.

Whilst it hadn't hurt him, Reuben had had enough. Being thrown over by a two and a half year old was too degrading. He took the kids off to Lilo and Stitch's house, hoping that Pleakley and Matrid could help. He hammered on the door, which was answered by Stitch.

"Hi."

"Hey, cuz, would it be ok if I took Ruby and Keltzam in here?"

"Ih…" The kids ran in. They were the same size as both Reuben and Stitch, and could be quite a handful. Reuben followed them into the kitchen, where Pleakley and his boyfriend Matrid were. Matrid was admiring Ruby's clothes, and Pleakley was trying to keep his eye on Keltzam.

"Wow, darling, that top really suits you! And your skirt… Gorgeous!"

Ruby beamed, and held out the hem of her yellow skirt, looking happily down at the yellow top with a duck on it.

"I dressed myself this morning," she announced proudly, "and brushed my hair all by myself." Reuben clapped his hands, and Matrid walked up to her, looking at her long purple curls, suggesting pigtails, matching hair bobbles, flowers, totally forgetting that he was talking to a two and a half year old and acting like he was chatting to a fellow model.

Meanwhile, Pleakley had coaxed Keltzam onto the top of the table and gave him some cookies. He turned to Reuben.

"Keltzam looks just like his dad, doesn't he?"

Reuben looked at the chubby little kid. He was wearing a t-shirt with a crocodile on it and green camouflage shorts, looking like an ordinary little boy, except for the four eyes, retractable arms and purple skin. He was the spitting image of Jumba, and always had been. When he was born, Lilo said that he looked like Jumba has when he had been baby-fied. Ruby looked like a purple version of her mother, who had also been chubby as a kid.

Unfortunately for Reuben, the kids had also inherited their parent's feelings towards him. Whilst this wasn't a problem with Ruby- she adored her Uncle Reuben, Keltzam refused to do anything he was asked by Reuben. Somehow, Reuben and Stitch managed to get the kids to sit and watch TV, but there was an argument as to what they would watch. Finally Lilo came back from the store and they played a game instead. Both Ruby and Keltzam did anything that Lilo said, because they thought of her as seriously cool, not understanding why the other girls didn't like her. Lilo enjoyed having people looking up to her, even though she knew that by the time they were three years old she would be looking up to them.

They were playing tag, when Ruby leapt out at Keltzam and he rolled down the stairs from top to bottom, bouncing like a beach ball. Reuben ran out of the living room to see him sitting at the bottom, dazed. Keltzam took one look at the large gash on his knee and started to scream, huge shuddering sobs that cut through the air like a dentist drill. Tutting and shushing, Reuben lifted him up and took him into the kitchen, putting a band-aid on it and giving him another cookie for being so brave. He tried to put him back down on the floor, but Keltzam clung to him, still sniffing a little.

"Ok, soldier. Nap time, eh? I'll get your sister." He placed him on the couch and was about to walk off when Keltzam spoke.

"Uncle Reuben?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm sorry I was bad today."

Placing Ruby down next to Keltzam and covering them over with a blanket, Reuben smiled. They really were adorable. He felt a bit like a father. Was this how Jumba had felt when he had created him, and all of his cousins? Was this how Jumba felt when he was with his kids? It must be, he decided. It was the 'good feeling' they had talked about earlier. He flicked out the light and sat in a chair, watching them drift off to sleep.

The next day, Reuben was having lunch at Jumba and Jeeba's house. They both looked refreshed and happy again, having had 15 hours of undisturbed sleep. Reuben and Jeeba were eating at the table, but Jumba was playing with the kids. He was crouched down on all fours, pretending to be a horse whilst Keltzam sat on his back, being a cowboy, and then whilst Ruby sat on his back, being Princess Ruby on her unicorn. Whenever he tried to stand up the kids would whine and wail, and yet he didn't seem to care. Now Reuben knew why. Babysitting the kids gave him the good feeling, so fathering them must be wonderful.

Ruby was like a daughter to Reuben, and even Keltzam seemed to like him now. In fact, Keltzam wasn't all that bad, he thought. In fact, he's a great kid.

"Oh, by the way, 625…" Jumba had managed to break away from the kids.

"Yeah?"

"What's this about flying trees, eh?"

From behind Jumba's back, Keltzam stuck out his tongue at Reuben. Pleakley was right. He was just like his father.


End file.
